


Tonight's the Night to Cross the Line

by lynnearlington



Category: Glee
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-09
Updated: 2012-02-09
Packaged: 2017-10-30 20:34:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/335787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lynnearlington/pseuds/lynnearlington
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rachel will succumb to the inevitable eventually. After all, Santana never plays a game she can’t win and she never wants anything she can't have. </p>
<p>In which Santana is the daughter of a local mob boss and Rachel sings at one of the bars Santana owns.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tonight's the Night to Cross the Line

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Pezberry Week Day 1: AU, any kind.

Of all her father’s properties, Santana likes The Blind Tiger the best. It’s dark, smoky, completely old school and when she walks through the doors in a tight black dress and heels, she feels powerful.   
  
It’s almost comical the way every eye in the place shifts to her as she enters, their gazes putting an extra sway to her hips and a smirk on her lips. It’s a fun game to play, meeting each and every stare and watching people shift their eyes away in silent deference.   
  
Every Thursday night since she turned twenty-one Santana’s come to this bar and sat at a table towards the back wall. Her father taught her early on that it was an important part of the business to make her presence known, even at the smallest level, and she took it to heart. Anything to help solidify her role in an empire she’ll one day take over.   
  
A few weeks ago, however, Santana started coming more frequently than usual. It’s her fifth visit just this week and the reason for it is standing on a small stage next to an old black piano, crooning out a familiar jazz standard across the bar.   
  
“Ms. Lopez,” one of the servers greets, smiling at her and pulling Santana’s eyes away from the stage. “Can I show you to your usual table?”   
  
“How long has Rachel been on?” Santana asks once she’s seated. She nods in thanks towards another server that slides a martini glass towards her and then pulls a slim cigarette case out of her purse.   
  
“Not long, ma’am. Just ten minutes.”   
  
Santana leans forward when a match is extended towards her and inhales against the white stick in her mouth, waiting for it to light before dismissing the server with a casual wave.   
  
Settled into her chair, Santana takes a drag of her cigarette and follows with her martini, sipping at the strong taste of gin as she watches Rachel Berry grip a microphone stand across the way.   
  
Rachel Berry. The new girl hired last month to sing every night starting at seven. Santana knows most of her story and it’s such a typical one that it’s almost a joke. Rachel came to the city looking for fame with her high school sweetheart. Fame didn’t pan out and her boyfriend found himself into a little trouble and a lot of debt. And so Rachel found herself in one of the many bars owned by the Lopez family around town, singing to pay off the tab her delinquent boyfriend ran up.   
  
Why Rachel’s still with the guy, or even helping to clean up his idiotic mistakes, Santana has no idea.   
  
\--  
  
Rachel plays a set of seven songs before taking a break and Santana goes through four cigarettes and an equal amount of martinis before she tells a passing waiter to send Rachel to her table.   
  
“You summoned,” Rachel says after she makes her way over, clear exasperation in her tone.  
  
Santana gestures to the chair across from her with a commanding tilt of her head and flags the bartender for a round of drinks. At this point they know Rachel’s order just as well as Santana’s and it’s not long before another martini glass is sliding towards Santana, a sweet manhattan towards Rachel.   
  
“This is really becoming an exhausting exercise,” Rachel says, but she picks up her drink anyway and Santana thinks it’s kind of cute the way Rachel acts like she doesn’t want to be here.   
  
“You know how to end it,” Santana responds dryly, stubbing out her cigarette in the ashtray in front of her and laughing at Rachel’s face as she waves away the smoke that wafts out of it with a disgusted wrinkle in her nose.   
  
It’s the game they’ve been playing for the past few weeks.   
  
\--  
  
The first time Santana ever laid eyes on Rachel, she knew she had to have her. She was all smooth legs, dark eyes, curly brown hair, and a voice that hit Santana low in her gut. Arousal pulled from inside her and just like that her mind was made up. When she wants something, she gets it.   
  
Santana had called her over to her table immediately after that first set was done and put on all her charm, laid it on the table for Rachel clear as day. It’s never failed her before. Women, men,  _everyone_  really, falls at Santana’s feet. If it isn’t the fact that sex basically oozes out of her every pore, it’s her name that makes the final catch. No one refuses a Lopez. Not in this city. Not if they valued their life.   
  
Except Rachel had just stared at her incredulously, jaw dropped, and stuttered out some rant about how inappropriate it was to hit on an employee, how she had a boyfriend, and how it could ruin her reputation in the bar to be seen with Santana in anything but a business capacity. And,  _fuck_ , that just made Santana want her more.   
  
She considered, in those first moments, pulling out the full weight of her family name, using it as leverage to get Rachel to sleep with her, but it’s been a long time since she’s had to work for something and she can’t deny that the idea of a chase is slightly thrilling.   
  
Rachel will succumb to the inevitable eventually. After all, Santana never plays a game she can’t win and she never wants anything she can’t have.   
  
\--  
  
“As I’ve said before, Santana,” Rachel begins, pulling her into the present. She sees Rachel sit up a little straighter, eyes narrowed and all Santana wants to do is hook a hand around her neck and kiss her. It’s becoming harder and harder to resist each time they do this.   
  
“You don’t work for me,” Santana interrupts, knowing exactly what Rachel is going to say and wanting to occupy her own mouth before she starts to put desire into action. “You work for my father.”   
  
“This is  _your_  bar last I checked and-”   
  
“You know who I am,” Santana states, crossing her legs and staring straight at Rachel until she nods. “Who my family is?”   
  
Rachel nods again, her fingers twisted around her glass. Santana watches her swallow visibly with some satisfaction, taking note of the way her fingers play with each other in absent nervousness. Power has always been a strange kind of aphrodisiac for Santana and she can’t deny that seeing Rachel simultaneously put up resistance and cower is making her stomach flip over pleasantly.   
  
“Then you know that when I really want something, I have it.”   
  
“I’m not something to have,” Rachel says quietly, but firmly. Her eyes go wide immediately after like she can’t believe she said that, but her jaw remains set.   
  
Santana laughs. “I like you,” she says simply, shrugging a little. “I want you,” she clarifies. “That much is obvious.”   
  
Rachel’s lips quirk up just a little bit and her shoulders relax just a titch as she takes a sip of her drink.   
  
“I want you,” Santana repeats. “And I’d like it if you’d just accept the inevitable and come home with me like I know you want to.”   
  
Rachel’s lips press into a thin line. “Why?”   
  
“Why what?”   
  
“Why do you like me?”   
  
A sharp chuckle bursts forth. “Because you don’t like  _me_  very much.”   
  
It gets a little answering laugh out of Rachel, “That seems like something you should see a therapist about.”   
  
“Jokes.” Santana nods briefly. “I like jokes. S’cute.”   
  
A brow quirks over Rachel’s right eye. “I’m here till ten.”   
  
“For now,” Santana replies and Rachel recognizes the threat, Santana watches the implication flash across Rachel’s face.   
  
“What do you want from me, Santana? You don’t even know me.”   
  
Santana crosses her arms over her chest, smirks when Rachel’s eyes drop immediately to her chest for a second. Sometimes when the family name doesn’t work, Santana has to bring out the big guns. “I know all about you.”   
  
“Oh really?”   
  
“Sure. Like how you’re still with the dumbass boyfriend you dragged here from small town, USA, how you’re paying off his idiotic debts with my father, and how you can’t stop thinking about sleeping with me.” The last part is said quieter than the rest, Santana’s voice dropping as she leans across the table slightly, licking her lips.   
  
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”   
  
“Why did you come to my city, Rachel?”   
  
Rachel’s eyes flick up to lock with Santana’s, her gaze intense. “You seem to think you already know everything about me, why don’t-”   
  
“Answer the question.” The authority in her voice is unmistakable.   
  
Rachel blinks, swallows, sighs. “To be a star.” Her eyes dart away for a second. “But plans change of course.”   
  
Santana’s eyes soften as she leans forward to grab Rachel’s attention. “I can make you a star.”   
  
“If I sleep with you,” Rachel finishes, rolling her eyes a little to clearly convey her feelings about that arrangement.   
  
Santana shrugs a shoulder, lets her gaze wander for a moment around the bar, her fingers twisting around the stem of her martini glass. “The sex is just a bonus.”   
  
“I don’t believe you.” Santana hears the bitterness and distrust in Rachel’s voice and wonders absently what Rachel Berry was like before the city got its hands on her.   
  
“Look,” Santana says. “I’ve heard you sing enough to know that you’re better than spending your nights paying off petty gambling debts for a deadbeat boyfriend. I’ve been here almost every night for the past few weeks and I know talent when I see it. It’s why my father’s given me control of places like The Blind Tiger. Like the State Theater across town.”   
  
“You think I’m talented?” Rachel asks softly.   
  
“I’d have to be deaf and blind not to see it,” Santana admits.   
  
Rachel flushes attractively. “Thank you.”   
  
“The point is,” Santana says firmly. “Yeah, I want to fuck you. Like  _really_  want to fuck you. Every time I hear you sing, I wonder what my name would sound like on your lips, wonder what you sound like when you come, wonder if I can make you sing with just my fingers.”   
  
Rachel’s blush deepens and she immediately finds something interesting to stare at in the wooden grooves of the table. “Santana,” she chastises in a nearly inaudible whisper.   
  
“And you want it, too. I see it every time you make it over to my table and can’t stop staring at my tits, or my lips, or the way my fingers are moving. I know all the moves in this game, Rachel. I know you want it just as much as I do. I don’t care what you say.”   
  
Rachel looks up, ready to spit out denial Santana’s sure, but she keeps talking before more lies can drop out of Rachel’s mouth.   
  
“But I also know a moneymaker when I see one. So if all you want from me is business, we’ll do business. When I say I can make you a star, I can. This city is all about who know. And knowing me...well...”   
  
“Why would you want to help me out?”   
  
“I told you,” Santana laughs. “If you’re not going to be giving me orgasms, you can at least start making me more money than the shitty tips you get in this place.”  
  
“It’s not that bad,” Rachel says softly.   
  
Santana sighs. “We’d make a good team. You and I. You’d make a good....” She trails off, laughing at herself a little and feeling a light flush dust across her cheeks. “You’d just be good. So let me know if you’re interested in actually making something of yourself. No strings.”   
  
Rachel takes a sip of her drink, eyes Santana over the rim of it with curious eyes.   
  
“Just know that I rarely fail in getting what I want. You might not be ready to admit it now, but some things are just inevitable. You’ll come around. Everyone always does.”   
  
“You’re pretty confident.”   
  
Santana shrugs. “Not without reason.”   
  
Rachel looks away pointedly, her jaw tightly clenched and clearly debating over Santana’s words.   
  
She runs a hand through her hair and rolls her head over her shoulders, looking around the bar again to see if there are any prospects for some late night company seeing as Rachel has yet again rebuffed her advances. She might want Rachel more than she knew she could want someone, but she’s not going to wait around for the girl  _alone._   
  
There’s an attractive blonde at the end of the bar swirling a straw in a tall purple drink that looks promising, but before she can think about approaching her, Rachel’s talking again.   
  
“I suppose you were right about one thing.”   
  
Santana quirks an eyebrow. “Which thing is that?”   
  
“I can’t stop thinking about sleeping with you,” Rachel confesses, eyes big and brown and full of promise. “Not since the first night.”  
  
They’re words Santana won’t ever forget because they change everything.   
  
“I can gladly turn thought into reality,” Santana offers, throwing the rest of her martini back.   
  
“I don’t know if you could live up to my imagination,” Rachel replies, smile playful and Santana wants to laugh.   
  
“Only fair to let me try, baby.”   
  
Rachel licks her lips, eyes roaming Santana’s face. “You were wrong about one thing though.”   
  
“What’s that?”   
  
“I broke up with my boyfriend the first night you asked me to sleep with you.”   
  
And with that, Santana’s standing and pulling Rachel out of her chair.   
  
\--  
  
They slip out of the bar together and Santana steers them to a town car idling on the street, waiting for her.   
  
“The penthouse,” Santana instructs her driver and laughs at the way Rachel’s eyes light up.   
  
In the elevator of an apartment building Santana’s family has owned for as long as she can remember, she watches the floor numbers tick by with aroused impatience. She’s been waiting for this moment for what feels like eternity and it’s finally here. The satisfaction of victory is thrumming over her skin, making everything tingle.   
  
Rachel’s voice comes from beside her, quiet. “I’m not sleeping with you to help my career.”   
  
Santana looks over at her. “Did I say you were?”   
  
“I don’t want you to think that,” Rachel continues, looking at Santana earnestly.   
  
“I’m going to make you a star,” Santana says lowly, moving into Rachel’s space and forcing her to take a step backwards, and then another until she’s pressed against one of the walls. “But that has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that tonight?” Santana strokes an errant curl away from Rachel’s face, smirks confidently. “I’m going to make you  _see_  stars.”   
  
The laugh that leaves Rachel is throaty and thick with desire. It makes Santana’s throat go dry and she wonders if she’s ever been this turned on in her life.   
  
“You’re lucky I fall for cheesy stuff like that,” Rachel says warmly.   
  
Santana kind of  _has_  to kiss her after that and it feels way too good when she finally does. She sucks Rachel’s top lip between her own and then pecks the bottom lip, her tongue stroking softly as her hands come up to grip the sides of Rachel’s neck. Rachel presses closer, her own hands firm on Santana’s hips as she slants their mouths together, the kiss languid and desperate at the same time.   
  
“It’s just tonight,” Santana mumbles between kisses. The elevator dings open and she walks them into the foyer of her penthouse, their lips still attached. “I meant what I said earlier. No strings.”   
  
“Just tonight?” Rachel asks and Santana’s not sure if she’s hearing relief or disappointment.   
  
“Whatever you want, baby,” Santana whispers, tossing her purse to the side and wrapping an arm around Rachel’s waist.   
  
“I want  _you_ .”   
  
“Then it’s a good thing that I’m a firm believer in getting what you want,” Santana says before she tips Rachel over the living room couch and presses their lips firmly together. 


End file.
